


in the rye grass and the creeper

by pianoblack



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Bugs & Insects, Gen, Originally Posted on Tumblr, POV First Person, relationship is really minor and implied, the magnus archives au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:55:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27246898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pianoblack/pseuds/pianoblack
Summary: Statement of Ronan Lynch regarding the disappearance of his former roommate Richard Campbell Gansey III.Statement begins.
Relationships: Richard Gansey III/Ronan Lynch
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	in the rye grass and the creeper

**Author's Note:**

> another entry in my halloween adjacent ficlets for october 2020. originally posted [here](https://stamatis.tumblr.com/post/632175227226423296/kks-trc-halloween-ficlet-whatever-week-2).

I’ve known Gansey for a few years now. It’s hard to describe him. There’s really no one else who compares. He dressed like a prep school ad - you know, perfectly starched polo shirts, boat shoes. Probably something he picked up from his renown political family. He talked like the oldest fucker you’ve ever met. Always saying shit like _incongruous_ and _I do declare._ I’ll never forget the day we met. He just showed up out of the blue in this bright orange Camaro. It felt so wrong. Like someone should have heralded him. There should have been trumpets or a whole damn parade. Anyway. Uh. He has these perfectly manicured fingernails. Stout fingers and calloused palms…. I taught him to fight, did you know that? When I showed him how to throw a punch he took it serious. Like, really serious. 

He died once. When he was a kid. Stepped on a wasp nest and they went after him. He survived, obviously. He would tell me that a ghost saved him. Or the spirit of a dead Welsh king. He’s fearless now except for wasps. I’ve seen him dive headlong into some of the craziest shit but the only thing that ever makes him think twice is wasps. I won’t pretend I understand it. It was just. I knew then that I wanted to - I just didn’t want him to go away.

It was his idea to fix up the warehouse on the edge of town. It looked like shit to me, honestly. Surprised it hadn’t been condemned. I mean looking back, I should have known. Maybe not _known_ known but I should have suspected, you know? He wink-wink nudge-nudge “accidentally” broke the lock on the shitty fence keeping us out. Just to look around. That was the sort of thing that was totally Gansey. He needed a place to himself and this was what he wanted. So I didn’t question it.

It was stuffy on the inside. Definitely abandoned. Shit everywhere. Two vacant stories that hadn’t been touched in forever. It was some old manufacturing warehouse or something. I don’t even know what kind of factory it was supposed to be. Everything had been mangled beyond recognition. It was metal all over. Industrial. It had this smell to it that slowly crept up on you the longer you stood in it. This deep infiltrating scent of decay. I honestly haven’t smelled anything like it since. It was visceral. Like the idea of rot took up space in your nose. Gansey breathed it all in and he said to me “It’s perfect.” He was so excited. I didn’t question it.

We spent a few weeks that summer fixing it up. We’d get there right as the sun was coming up and work until it got too dark to do anything useful. I mostly did the reno part of it. The fine grunt work. Rewiring. Repainting. Refinishing. All the re-type stuff. I grew up helping my mom with housework since my dad was always away on business and my older brother cared more about hanging out with his friends than doing anything for the family. Gansey did the demolition. And he took all the old crap. 

We started on the first floor but it was unsalvageable. Even Gansey agreed on that. Broken machines and glass and god knows what else were all down there. We took a look at it one time and noped out pretty quick. Never went down there again. The second story was much nicer anyway. Big floor to ceiling windows. Lots of space and light. It was a dream come true.

There was this one day when I came by later in the afternoon. It was Sunday so I had church that morning with my family. Gansey was already at the warehouse. I knew he was there. His Camaro was out front. I called out for him but he didn’t answer. I opened the front door and the sound ricocheted louder than anything. And then - nothing. It was quiet. Almost deadly quiet expect for one thing: a faint persistent buzzing. Yeah I thought it was a little weird but the building was so old it would have been anything. Whatever. I called for Gansey again when I reached the top of those metal stairs and I swear the buzzing just stopped. Cut out immediately. Paused and hung heavy in the air. It was like I could hear my heart beating in my ears. I looked over the room and I saw - like, really saw for the first time - how filthy the place was. Dust and bullshit everywhere. We weren’t the cleanest and yeah I’ve been known to make a mess of myself but I won’t ever forget this feeling of something crawling just under my skin. I remember thinking if I looked at my arms I’d see something scurrying.

Anyway, I finally noticed Gansey over in the far corner. The one farthest away from the door. I learned later that no matter the time of day, sunlight never touched over there. He was crouched, not quite kneeling, like he was looking for something. My heart had been racing, I could feel it slowing in my throat. I never believed that you could actually feel relief rushing your muscles or whatever poetic shit like that, but in that moment I felt it. I started to walk towards him. I opened my mouth and said a little bullshit about how he nearly scared me shitless, but then I saw how he didn’t move.

Things got worse as I got closer. First - the smell. It hit me all at once. I’ve been punched in the face before and it was exactly like that - just getting beat over and over and over again. It was disgusting. I stuffed my face in the crook of my elbow but it was everywhere. Then I could see them. Trailing up his outstretched arms and scattering all over his body. So many fucking bugs. And Gansey? Gansey was standing so still. He held himself there and let the whole thing happen. It’s like he didn’t even notice me.

I had to do something. I rushed over and there was this chittering, buzzing noise. It just got louder and louder. I grabbed Gansey by the shoulder and pulled him into the light. I could feel their little legs and antennas as I swept my hands over him trying to smack as many bugs away from him as I could. There were so many but -

It was just ants. Only ants. Nothing else. They fled back into the dark corner and by the time we made it to the front door they had all gone.

So we stayed at The Barns that night. Nothing felt right. Usually the sound of cicadas are like a lullaby. The sight of fireflies are like a night light. I didn’t sleep. I couldn’t. And neither did Gansey.

We didn’t have another incident for a while. Sure, that corner ended up always crawling with ants no matter what we did. I set traps and sprayed every kind of poison. No matter how much I cleaned over there, they kept coming back. We never put anything in that corner after that.

I noticed that Gansey would get - how to put this - _obsessed_ with it. I would catch him staring at it sometimes. I don’t think he knew that I knew. Never said anything. He faced his bed, his chair, his desk toward the corner. Spent hours and hours staring at it. Never getting close or saying anything, just looking. He had this look on his face like he wanted to reach into that darkness and see what happened. He didn’t, though. Not at first. I never actually caught him doing it, but I swear he would talk to them. To the bugs, yeah. I know what you’re going to say: maybe he was just talking to himself? But, no. No, that wasn’t it. It was the bugs. He’d tell them about his day or about Glendower or about his girl problems and sometimes…he’d tell them about me. Like I said, I never really caught him in the act. I just know he did, okay?

It was maybe a month or so into fixing the place when I found - when my dad died. A lot of shit went down that week but long story short I ended up living with Gansey at the warehouse. It was shit. Hated it. Not because of the place. It was whatever. Anywhere I lived after all of that would have been awful. It’s hard to feel good about anything when you’re never sure it’s going to get taken away. 

Gansey was the best part. He was always the best part. He at least tried to make it homey. He gave me my own room and didn’t even lift an eyebrow when I brought back my dad’s bloodstained BMW. He rolled up his sleeves and started talking to me about Welsh kings or ley lines or whatever while we scrubbed away the dirt.

That was when I first noticed the bugs had a thing for him. Like they were attracted. Mosquitoes constantly buzzed around his head. Ants would crawl up his legs. A cricket hopped up right by Gansey this one time and played a little song like it was looking for his approval. Gansey didn’t seem to notice at all. I know, I know. I should have asked him about it. But whenever I mustered up the nerve to do it I remembered the terror in his face that one afternoon so I stopped myself.

Then it happened. It wasn’t summer anymore but it was still too fucking hot. I couldn’t sleep because I was barely sleeping at the time. And Gansey couldn’t sleep because - well, Gansey was Gansey. I had my headphones on and I had my music as loud as it would go because I remember feeling so angry. And I wanted to sleep. Pass out. Dreamless.

But there was this buzzing. I thought it might have been my headphones at first. Faulty wires or blown speaker or something but it persisted. I threw my headphones off and it was louder than before. I could feel it in my teeth. I called for Gansey but - but he didn’t hear me. There was no way he could through all the buzzing.

It got worse when I opened the door to my room. It was so loud out there. Deafeningly loud. Like a summer night but turned up past eleven. The smell was back. That rotting smell of death. There’s no other way to describe it. It was like the building itself had become rot incarnate.

I thought at first my vision was going from all the noise and the horrible smell. The walls were practically pulsating, almost like they were endlessly crumbling without ever actually toppling. I put a hand against the door jamb to steady myself. They started to crawl all over me as soon as my palm touched metal. Every bug imaginable. Every last one skittering across my hands nearly engulfing me in a second.

All I could think in that moment was Gansey. Where was he? Was he safe? I ran across the room to his bed. There wasn’t a surface that wasn’t swimming with bugs. I pulled back the blanket and a wave of crickets and worms went flying over everything. I dropped the blanket. Gansey wasn’t in his bed. He wasn’t upstairs. I tried to get close to the corner but all the bugs were pushing me back like a current. Every time I took a step closer they were on the offensive. They were out for blood. Mandibles bared. Stingers ready. The air was filling up, too. Thick with flying things like mosquitoes and beetles and -

The buzzing. The buzzing of a thousand wings beating against the night air like a drum. Louder than the bang of my heart in my throat. I’m sure I was screaming by then. I know I tore down those metals stairs without any shoes. I have the cuts on my feet to prove it. But I don’t remember any of that. Just the buzz and the scent. I’ll never forget either of those things.

It was like my nightmares of that afternoon had come to life. Gansey was downstairs in the unfinished first floor. He was standing perfectly still. Right above his head, swirling all around him, circling his entire body - wasps. A swarm of them. An entire army. I could barely make out Gansey among all of it. They had surrounded him and I could only just see the flashes of his skin in between their thousands of legs and wings. I wasn’t imagining it. I knew without a doubt…I could feel it. He was so absolutely terrified.

I tried. I really tried, okay? I did everything I could to get to him but those damn bugs. There were so many and they didn’t let me get one step into that room. They were forcing me back. I remember their stings and nettles and bites. I don’t have any scars to prove it but I remember the feel of it. Sometimes I still feel a stinger stabbing into my skin or I feel the breezy rush of tiny legs marching along. I remember the way it looked. The way it smelled. The way it sounded. I pushed as hard as I could but I couldn’t even get close. I called desperately for Gansey. There were so many wasps. I didn’t - I don’t want to think about what could have happened.

The rest is -

I - I don’t remember it very well. I don’t - I’m not proud of what I did. I must have somehow made it back to my car. They were following me. No, pursuing me. A few of them found a way in. It wasn’t even bugs I’d seen before. These weird ones I’ve never even knew existed. I didn’t want to leave Gansey. I know I would never leave him. He’s my -

I drove as far as possible as fast as possible. I just remember the sun blinding me at some point and I was a few good hours outside of town. All the bugs in my card had died.

I went back to the warehouse as soon as I came to and it was cleaned out. A decrepit old condemned sign hung on a fence wrapped around the perimeter that looked like it had been there for years. Gansey’s Camaro was gone. Not even track marks for the tires. Just untouched dirt. It was dead silent. No buzzing. No chirping.

I went in, of course. This was our home and I wasn’t going to leave Gansey. I wanted to make sure he was…safe. 

None of our stuff was in there. Not a trace of anything. It had been cleaned so pristinely. Even that stupid shitty corner was practically shining. The entire place was empty. It didn’t quite hit me until I breathed in and it just smelled like concrete in a Virginia summer.

I tried Gansey’s phone but he didn’t answer. I was able to leave him a message but it’s been disconnected since then. Just a dial tone. Not even one of those messages that goes _stop trying to call dumbfuck this shit’s busy_. I asked around if anyone had seen Gansey or his Camaro. Nope. Nothing. People remembered him, so it wasn’t like he just vanished off the face of the earth. They told me stories. They told me how Gansey was so kind and curious and so many other wonderful things but no one had seen him. I’ve been so close to giving up looking for him. But I know that I can’t. I can’t give up. He’s still out there, I’m sure. I know he is. 

I haven’t had any luck for months. No leads, no signs. Nothing. Well, there is one thing. I don’t know how related it is but ever since I moved into the church there’s been a very persistent spider. Parrish says he’s never had an issue with bugs or anything. It was one of the few things he liked about the place. I liked it too. But ever since I’ve been living there webs have started appearing up in the corners on the ceiling. I know it’s all one spider. Parrish has never seen the spider itself. She only seems to come out for me. She never does anything. I just watch her wave her web for hours and hours. What? Oh, how do I know the spider is a she? I guess I just. Know. Like how I know she’s not dangerous. Well not exactly _not-dangerous_. I just know she won’t touch me.

Maybe it’s nothing. It doesn’t mean anything. Spiders never bothered Gansey. It’s probably nothing. Maybe I just…Maybe I just miss him.

STATEMENT ENDS


End file.
